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sirona_ficsTitle: Mission 'Secure Danno's Affections'
Authors:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
delicatale and sirona_gs
Pairing: Steve/Danny
Rating: Hard R
Word count: ~8,300
Warnings: er, fluff?
Summary: Steve realises just how much time he's been spending with Gracie when that's how he starts referring to his plan to woo Danny through terrible, heart-attack-inducing Jersey food. He has researched, he has strategized, he has called in reinforcements. There really isn't any way this could go wrong.
Notes: Sodelicatale said to me, DO YOU KNOW THAT FIC WHERE STEVE SPENDS HOURS AND HOURS LEARNING HOW TO COOK ALL THE BEST SPECIALITIES OF NJ TO MAKE DANNY HAPPY AND DANNY IS OBLIVIOUS BECAUSE THAT'S WHO HE IS? BECAUSE THAT FIC SHOULD EXIST. Thus, there you have it! And because we were both feeling a little low, and needed a pick-me-up, this got written in literally under 10 hours, all told. Also, it's come to our notice that there are apparently a lot of people out there right now who are feeling ill, or under the weather, or a little low. So this is for all of you guys, with our love. <3
After much covert (and, he's grudgingly willing to concede, slightly obsessive even for him) observation, Steve can at last confirm his findings. Danny, it seems, despite being amazing, and interestingly eloquent, and a proper firecracker to boot, is no different than any other man in Steve's acquaintance. In other words -- the way to Danny's heart, Steve has concluded, is through his stomach.
Because Danny, Danny loves his food like nothing Steve has ever seen. Danny eats like he--uh. Well. Steve has nothing but suspicions, and a slightly overactive imagination at this point, despite his attempts to the contrary, but he would like to think that Danny eats like he makes love, because, seriously, no one should make the kinds of sounds that come out of Danny's mouth at the dinner table. Not unless he wants to be pressed against the surface and ravished, which, this is usually the point when Steve's brain shuts down in self-defence.
The worst thing about his embarrassing crush on his partner? Is how often these kinds of thoughts slip into Steve's mind, every single day. It's getting to the point where Steve finds himself at half-mast at the mere mention of lunch, or when Chin brings in a box of Liliha's coco puffs. Danny's face when he sees the box in Chin's hands is a thing of beauty -- and has a starring role in Steve's dreams of late, only it's not Chin who is holding the box, and it isn't really the focus of Danny's attention.
This has got to stop, one way or another. And since Steve can no more imagine figuring out a way to stop thinking about it, bar sending Danny back to HPD (which is not an option), it's door number two. And there's really nothing else to be done. Steve will have to seduce him, and make sure Danny only eats with him whenever possible.
Thus, Steve devises a cunning plan. He has researched, he has strategized, he has called in reinforcements. There really isn't any way this could go wrong.
---
Steve has a few, very slight, reservations regarding what he is about to attempt. It looks easy enough, if getting a hot dog wrapped in bacon to stay wrapped as he deep-fries it can ever be called easy. Just the thought of subjecting his arteries to that hellish concoction makes him want to break out in hives, but, well. He imagines the look on Danny's face when he sees it, and strangely enough it soothes his doubts to a manageable degree. It's Saturday lunchtime anyway; maybe he can goad Danny into going on a hike with him again, or just for a long walk, or to the beach with Chin and Kono and Lori tomorrow, burn off some calories. Oh, he'll bitch, but his heart will thank Steve twice over when he doesn't keel over and die during the next on-foot chase through Waikiki.
Procuring the meat is pretty easy. He just hits up Kamekona, and the big guy points him straight to the best supplier on the island. It costs him more than he'd be willing to part with on an ordinary day, but fuck, if Danny's forcing Steve to feed him all the grease in the world, the least he can put up with is good quality hot dog and a bacon with as little fat as possible while still palatable. The guy who serves him is quick and efficient, cleaver flashing in the morning sunlight, and he's so good-natured about Steve's grumpy yet resigned glower that Steve makes a note to come back whenever he needs anything like this again. Back at home, he dumps his purchases on the kitchen table and unpacks them, setting them aside until he can chop up and fry the onions.
He manages (barely) not to cry as he does just that, his skills with a knife coming in surprisingly handy. He’s never been much for cooking, if only because you don’t have to in the military, but still, he finds a keen pleasure in chopping and prepping and sizzling, something wonderfully relaxing to the act. And then, there’s the idea behind the plan, the whole reason why Steve is in his kitchen, right now, frying onions and wrapping a hot dog in bacon, carefully, sticking toothpicks in each end of the bacon slice to keep it in place until it’s cooked. There’s Danny, the mental image of the face he’ll make when he’ll take the first bite, reminding him of Jersey in a way that doesn’t really scare Steve any more.
If there’s one thing he knows, Steve thinks as he pushes the sausages in the pan along with the onions, is that Danny is here now, and here to stay. It’s been hard, and Danny’s obvious fear of commitment had not helped, but, as long as Grace is here, so is Danny. Sometimes Steve thinks about how Danny didn’t leave when Rachel and Grace did, too, and it makes something funny explode in his stomach, makes him hard, too, to the point where he’s never thinking about it any more. At work.
Right now, he allows the thought to swirl around in his head, around his mouth; Danny stayed for him, to help him, because somehow Steve matters to him. Now, Steve wants to matter more, and if anyone tells him it’s selfish, well, Steve has a list as long as his leg of acts he’s done for his country, selflessly. Fuck that; he deserves this, he deserves Danny.
While the sausages cook, Steve washes his hands, the chopping board and the knife he used, before sending Danny a text to remind him of their plans. He doesn’t call it a date, because he knows better and he likes to tease and push Danny’s buttons much more when they’re in the same room, but he still thinks it. He’d be the cheapest date Danny ever had, for sure; a drink would be enough, and Danny would never let Steve live it down, but.
But as it is, they’re not there, and the more Steve thinks this way, the harder it’s going to be to hide the way his cock is tenting his cargoes.
After checking the sausages, Steve grabs another pan and gets started on the fried eggs to go under them, thinking sorrowfully about heart attacks, but still, he doesn’t back down. It’s part one of his plan, and if he ever hopes for Danny to understand what he’s trying to achieve, well, Steve has to start with a bang. A grand gesture, full of chili sauce and clogged arteries.
Steve slices the bun open as the eggs sing happily in the pan, the sausages almost ready, bacon sticking to their curves, satisfyingly brown and crispy. Some of the onions have gone black, but Steve will just leave them out. He gets flour all over the front of his shirt trying to slice the buns perfectly and failing three times before deciding it’ll do, and smears chili sauce all over them. He’s everywhere at once, turning off the gas under the sausages and checking if the egg yolks are still sort of runny, shaking pans and making sure everything is ready before he starts piling it all up on the bun. First the egg, yolk half-hard (just like Steve is), then the sausage, toothpicks carefully removed, the bacon precariously staying in place.
And there he has them. He leaves them in the oven at a very low heat just to keep them warm while waiting for Danny, who strolls in with coffees about ten minutes later, wearing jeans and a t-shirt, his hair looking soft and fluffy, despite being slicked back as always.
"Hey," he says, sniffing the air eagerly. "Have I wondered into the wrong house? Am I smelling what I think I'm smelling? Are you, Steven 'Health Freak' McGarrett, making deep-fried hot dogs for some reason? Is the world going to end in the next half an hour, did you set off something that will blow up the planet, is this an end-of-world party? Is that why you went all Punctuality Squad on me?"
Steve rolls his eyes. Strangely, the state of his cock does not alter with the ramble. He's got it bad. He rolls his eyes for cover.
"Hello to you, too," he says dryly, reaching for the coffee Danny's holding out. "What's with the third degree?"
Danny eyes him, transfers his measuring gaze onto the pile of dirty pans in the sink, and lifts an eyebrow.
"I know it's not my birthday. Do you know how I know that, Steven? Because my birthday is in August, and it is not August right now. So the only rational explanation I've got for this departure from the norm from you is end-of-world scenarios--aaand I realised what I just said. Forget all that; rational, what was I thinking."
A hand waves precariously close to Steve's nose as Danny dismisses his ramble, pulling out a chair at the table and plonking himself down like he's just run all the way here from his flat.
"You done?" Steve says, laying out plates and dropping a pile of paper napkins on the table.
"Yep, I'm done, come on, food now. It smells amazing, what the hell have you got in there?"
Steve makes a big show of removing the hot dogs from the oven, still warm and delicious-looking, and setting them on the table. Danny's eyes go huge, so blue it's almost painful to look at them head-on; Steve has to look away so he doesn't become a cliche and get lost in them, because that would just be fucking embarrassing at this point. He pulls out the bottle of chilli sauce that he'd gone to the shop to get last night after work, places it between them on the table. Then he snags two beers from the fridge, snaps them open and hands one to Danny, who takes it as if in a trance.
Danny's mouth is open, jaw working like he wants to say something, say a lot of things, but no words are coming, and after a moment of staring he reaches for the chilli sauce, slurps a generous serving over his food, and picks it up.
And, really. That sound right there, if Steve could bottle it he would make a killing -- if he wasn't so damn selfish when it came to Danny and all his sounds, and words, and looks.
Danny chews and swallows, and moans, and goes back for more, mouth opening wide and teeth chomping down firmly, sauce dribbling out of one corner of his lips. Steve must have stopped breathing a while back, because his lungs ache, and his skin feels too small for his body.
"Steven," Danny groans, and Steve has to bite down hard on the inside of his mouth not to press the heel of his hand to the front of his pants and rub himself off right there and then. "Steven, what did you do, oh my God and all the saints and as many Hail Marys as this requires, I don't even care if you're about to blow up the world, I would die happy right now."
Danny's lips are red where the spicy chilli has rubbed them flushed, and he runs his tongue over them before taking another bite and closing his eyes, releasing a sound Steve has never heard before, even in the bedroom, and Cath could moan with the best of them. He can't stop staring. He can't. He's vaguely aware that he is being a right ass about this, because perving over your partner, surely that isn't in the approved handbook of appropriate reactions to one's co-workers. But Danny is incredible like this, pure delight, enjoyment and happiness leaking off him and suffusing the air, warming Steve to his core.
"What are you doing, what, for the sake of everything holy eat that before I take it off you," Danny mumbles, mouth still half-full, eyeing Steve's own hot dog greedily. Steve desperately wants to say, 'nah, 's all right, you have it', but that would just be weird, and Danny's not stupid, not by a long shot. He's bound to figure out something isn't right.
...But then again, isn't that the point of this exercise? For Danny to be wowed by Steve's prowess in the kitchen? Steve debates with himself, until the decision is taken out of his hands entirely when Danny finishes his own food and pulls Steve's plate closer, drenching it with chilli sauce again and demolishing it faster than Steve can blink. He can't quite contain the pleased smile over his face, and he's expecting endless mocking for that once Danny can speak again.
Danny, surprisingly, says nothing. No, he licks his fingers clean, and only after he's made sure every last drop of sauce is off them does he reach for a napkin, leaning back in his chair and sighing, a little whimper of pleasure in the back of his throat, and fuck, if he makes Steve stand up right now, the game will be well and truly over. It's enough that his breathing is rapid, and his pupils are dilated, and he's pretty sure his cheeks are flushed, and if Danny was capable of higher thought at the moment Steve is sure he'd be screwed anyway.
"You know," Danny drawls, a sensuous sound that makes Steve want to grab him by the arms and haul him in his lap. "I don't even care that you're mocking me right now, I can see that smirk, I know when I'm being mocked. It doesn't even matter. You know why? Because you made me a danger dog, and you didn't even add pineapple. You, Steven, are officially my second favourite person in the world after Grace."
Steve breathes a sigh of relief. This, he can work with. "I take it you enjoyed that, then," he says dryly, fighting a smile. Danny doesn't look like he's fooled. He picks up his beer bottle, offers the neck to Steve. Bemused, Steve clinks his bottle to Danny's, because, well. It's automatic.
"Thank you," Danny says, eyes serious for once. "I don't know what made you do it, or what crazy thought you had in that head of yours, but thank you. That was... It was. Something."
"You're welcome, Danno," Steve says, doesn't elaborate. Danny lets him get away with it with merely a raised eyebrow.
After that, well, there's a game on TV, and Steve sneaks in a sandwich while he makes popcorn and fetches more beer. He feels better about it than the heart-attack-on-a-plate; Danny is full, pleased--scratch that, vocally happy where he's yelling at the TV and back at Steve through the open kitchen door; all is right with the world. And even if nothing more happens today, Steve will still count it as a win.
---
Steve rehearsed this call all of the night before, wondering exactly how it’d go, running his explanation for the call over and over again in his head. He’d call Ma Williams, but for having been on the phone a few times with her already, he knows she’d give him so much shit for trying to pretend he was doing this for any other reason than to seduce Danny, and he isn’t sure he can deal with that. It’s hard enough not to break and just tell Danny; he knows he has no chance of standing his ground under the pressure from Danny’s mother.
His second choice is Molly. As the youngest of the Williams tribe, she had to have insights of what her brother likes to eat best, when it comes to cake - something Steve is still not privy to, besides coco puffs and malasadas, which just won’t do. And Molly’s nice to him, she doesn’t quite mock him as much as Holly does. He’ll remember their visit forever, though, the tsunami the two of them were on the island and in his life, in Danny’s life, for the span of the week they spent in Honolulu.
So he decides on Molly. And it’s awkward; fuck, it’s awkward, and he tries to be casual about it, his excuse that Danny’s just broke his 100th case sounding fake and weird to his own ears, but she seems to buy it. She seems to buy it enough to let out, “Pineapple,” and Steve chokes on his next breath.
“Pineapple,” he repeats, like he didn’t heard her right. He worries his bottom lip between his teeth as he looks up the recipe on the Internet, pressing the phone even closer to his ear.
“Are you sure about that?” he asks, because he’s not sure if Molly isn’t taking him for a ride, here. He doesn’t want to fuck this up, he cannot fuck this up, and if she’s mocking him and giving him the wrong idea, well, his carefully cooked danger dog will have been a waste, and he’ll have to start from scratch.
“I am sure about that, Steve. He doesn’t say he likes it, but I promise you, there is little else other than a pineapple upside-down cake that gets him going.”
Steve feels himself flush. “I don’t want to get him going, Molly.”
Molly laughs heartily. “Yeah, right. I might be nice, but I’m not stupid, Steve. I tell you, pineapple upside-down cake. Believe me, okay?”
“Okay, okay.” Steve runs a hand over his face, closing his eyes as he makes an internal list of the ingredients he’s got in the kitchen, just to make sure he can even do this cake if he decides on it. It’s not like he’s got many other choices anyway, and he’s got to trust Danny’s very own sister with this, because he’s got no one else to ask.
“Any regular chocolate cake will do, too, but it won’t have the same effect, believe me.”
Steve nods. He wants Danny to make the noises he made while eating the danger dog again, he needs to hear these sounds again, to see Danny look that way. So he nods to himself.
“Okay. Thanks, Molly, I appreciate it.”
“That’s okay. Any time you need, Steve, I like my brother happy, and seems you help with that, so,” she lets it hang, there, and Steve flushes again, like a fucking schoolboy with an embarrassing crush.
“I, um. I should go, get started on that cake.”
Molly chuckles again, this time indulgently. “Yeah, okay. Bye, Steve.”
“Thanks again. Bye.”
After this certainly awkward and embarrassing phone call, Steve prints out a recipe for a pineapple upside-down cake, and makes sure he’s got everything in his pantry to make said cake. He’s not lacking in anything, which is not surprising considering he bought everything in bulk, but suddenly he’s faced with the enormity of this - what he’s doing. He’s baking a cake, for Danny, a cake with pineapples in it, when Danny has spent so long telling him all the ways in which he doesn’t like pineapples. It’s crazy, and Steve doesn’t bake, he’s not baked anything since before his mother died, when he helped out just to be able to lick the bowl.
He remembers the easy rhythm of flour-butter-sugar-eggs, though, and tries (and fails) not to make too big of a mess around the kitchen while he sets to. He spends the time taken up by whisking and measuring to try and think of an excuse for doing this that will fly with Danny, other than 'Look, I kind of might be quite a bit in love with you, and seriously, the noises you make, my bed feels cold and lonely without you in it', which, while true, is not something Steve can say without choking at certain points. In the end he can't actually think of anything that will even remotely count as an excuse, and resorts to cheating. He knows Danny's schedule like he knows his own, and Danny has Grace this weekend. Which would be the perfect excuse for having a treat lying around for when Gracie comes to visit with her dad.
Danny, when Steve calls him and invites them over, doesn't suspect a thing. Success! thinks Steve, and pours the batter into a cake form, shoving it into the preheated oven and pulling the whipped cream carton out of the fridge. He's testing the consistency when cars slam in the doorway and running footsteps close in, followed by the front door slamming open and Gracie's "Uncle Steeeeve! We're here!" yelled from the living room.
Grace appears in the kitchen doorway a moment later, flushed and grinning, obviously excited to be here. Steve's heart flips over in his chest and then sends heat through his entire body; he grins back helplessly.
"Hey, Gracie," he says, patting the front of his clothes to get rid of the flour before he crouches down to give her a hug. She hangs on when he tries to straighten and, laughing, he takes her up with him.
"What are you making?" she wants to know, peeking at the bowl of whipped cream curiously.
"It's a pineapple upside-down cake," Steve confides. "Do you think we could persuade Danno to have some?" It's good to set up some ground work, for if and when he might need it.
“Oh, Danno loves it! He doesn’t like to say, though.”
Steve grins, something happy and satisfied blossoming in his chest. Molly didn’t lie, and he’s doing this, and it’s going to work out. It has to, because if it doesn’t, and Danny doesn’t get it, well, he has no idea what he’s going to do. But he can’t go there, it’s too soon for him to worry about his plan not working out in the end, not giving him the results he wants (needs).
“Wanna help me put the glaze on?”
“Yes!”
“What are you two conspiring about? What is that smell?”
"Steve is making a cake! It's your favourite, Danno!"
"Oh yeah?" Danny walks inside finally, dressed just as casually as last time, those black jeans of his that tend to give Steve palpitations and a plain white T-shirt. He looks so much like that time Steve made Danny climb to the summit with him that something shakes loose in Steve's chest, the image of Danny making a giant heart in the air and pointing at him. Steve doesn't even know how he held himself together, didn't blubber his feelings everywhere for the world to see.
Danny walks closer, tweaks Grace's plaits when Steve puts her down, looks down at the whipped cream and the rum glaze, and back at Steve.
"Huh," he says, and there's something knowing in his eyes that makes Steve break out in goosebumps. He can't look away.
"Uncle Steve, the timer's about to go!"
Steve turns to look, at that. Grace has her nose almost pressed to the oven door, watching the cake through the fireproof glass. "Come away, Gracie, you'll get burned. Is it ready, do you think?"
"Uh-huh!" Grace says, nodding eagerly.
"All right, then! Let's take it out!"
He fetches the oven mitts and turns the heat off, opens the door and stands back to let the steam escape. Grace is almost vibrating by Danny's side, watching Steve bring the cake to the table, where there's a wire rack waiting.
"Do you like whipped cream or ice cream on yours, Gracie?" he asks, to distract her from having to wait a few minutes before they can turn it over.
"Ice cream!" is the answer; the 'obviously' goes unsaid, but it's heavily implied.
"Okay," he says, smiling. "Ice cream it is. Danny?"
"I like cream," Danny says, sliding his eyes away from the bowl of it on the counter.
"Excellent! I have us all covered. Here, Gracie, bring me that plate."
She does, and they all watch as Steve deftly turns the cake over. Caramel drizzles down over the pineapples, and the cake glistens deliciously. Steve raises a questioning eyebrow at Danny, picking up the bottle of dark rum. Danny nods, waves a hand. Steve splashes some in a shotglass, hands it to Grace, and together they drizzle it over the top of the cake.
"Perfect," Grace declares, bouncing on her heels.
"Yes it is," Danny agrees, sending Steve a Look. Steve shrugs. "But before we can all have some, it has to cool, remember."
Grace nods gravely. "Can we go for a swim?"
"Can you go for a swim? Ask your Uncle Steve here, nicely."
"Can we please go for a swim, Uncle Steve?" she chirps, like there's any chance in hell that Steve would, or could, say no to her. Danny's laughing at him silently; he knows, the bastard.
"Sure, Gracie. I think you left your spare swimsuit in Mary's room last time. Why don't you go put it on?"
Grace runs out, and Steve sends Danny a dry look.
"I won't eat any of it until you're back," Danny declares.
"Didn't think you would," Steve lies. But he can't help it -- he wants to be there when Danny takes his first mouthful. He wants to savour the view.
Grace is back before he can say anything more, and he gets changed into his own swimshorts, races her out to the waterfront, laughing as he goes. He can feel Danny's gaze drilling between his shoulderblades, watching them from the back door. He tries not to let it affect him, but he’s quite grateful for the shock of cold water when he wades into the ocean anyway.
He plays with Gracie for a while, and she manages to make him forget about everything, his plan and his worries and work, and even Danny, a little, until she’s shrieking and laughing and looking so much like both her parents it’s making Steve’s heart clench.
When they get out Danny is waiting for them with two towels, big fluffy white ones he must have found in Steve’s laundry room. He wraps Grace in one, handing the other to Steve, his eyes flicking over Steve before moving away quickly, like, like he’s embarrassed or scared of his own thoughts, which is sort of good, in Steve’s opinion. Good, or terribly bad, depending.
But then they’re back in the kitchen with Gracie all wrapped up, her pigtails dripping on the towel, and Steve with his own towel around his shoulders, and he meets Danny’s eyes over the cake, and that is definitely not bad, that look there, it’s a good look. It’s a look that is sort of undressing Steve, and he’s already not wearing a lot, so it’s definitely a good look where Steve is concerned.
“Can we have some of the cake now?” Grace sounds too excited and Steve’s stomach grumbles, so he gets a knife, cake forks and some plates from his cupboards, leaving them on the table.
“Yeah, we definitely should.” He cuts three pieces, fairly even, gives Grace hers before handing one to Danny, leaving the third piece in front of himself, but he doesn’t touch it.
“Oh, Uncle Steve, that’s so good!” Steve smiles at Grace’s exclamation, but he doesn’t turn to her, keeping his eyes trained on Danny as he breaks a piece of the cake, playing with it for a moment, like he’s reluctant to try it.
“I thought you liked pineapple upside-down cake?”
Danny looks up, startled. Grace is already absorbed in one of the books she brought with her, not really paying attention to them any more, and Steve is glad, so glad, because he’s blushing and he doesn’t want her to notice, he doesn’t even want Danny to notice that, fuck, he’s making a fool of himself.
“I do! I do. It’s just. Okay, so the other day you made us danger dogs, and now this, is there like, some kind of half-birthday thing I’ve missed, or are you about to tell me something really upsetting and you’re trying to placate me with food? I just like to know what I’m getting myself into, and I have no idea what’s going on here.”
Steve feels his mouth go dry and he contemplates his own piece of cake; fuck, he doesn’t like pineapple cake all that much, and it’s not going to help the way his mouth feels like sandpaper. The excuse he gave Molly will not work with Danny, and he can’t tell him the truth, he’s not helping him more than he’s already trying. Steve is not about to do all the work, here.
“I knew you had Grace, so I thought she’d like a cake.”
Danny stares at him. And it's just, this is one of the reasons he lo--uh. Likes Danny so much. Danny is no fool. Danny is, in fact, one of the best detectives Steve has ever worked with, and Danny has never been afraid to call him on his bullshit. Which he is now doing, even when he isn't saying a word. And a quiet Danny is a dangerous Danny.
"Are you serious with this?" Danny says after a moment, softly, so Grace doesn't hear. Steve fidgets, looks down at his plate, away at Gracie's dark head.
"I just thought. We never really did anything after you, uh, stayed here to help me, rather than go back to Jersey. And I never said thank you. Because I am grateful, Danny, you don't know how much. You--it really, um. It was--good."
Danny's watching him again, but this time his eyes are soft, and his mouth has turned up into this small smile, sad, almost. He looks like he wants to say--a lot. But then his gaze falls on Grace again, and then he's narrowing his eyes and sending Steve this Look, the one that pretty much spells out 'We're not done talking about this'. Steve ducks his head, doesn't say anything, because, yeah. They're not done, not by a long shot, not if he has anything to say about it.
Point made, Danny looks back down at his plate. He slices off the end of the piece with his fork, picks it up and, looking straight at Steve, puts it in his mouth. His eyes flutter close, and he makes a guttural sound deep in his throat, chews, licks his lips. His eyes open again, at half-mast, icy blue peeking through long eyelashes, fixing unerringly on Steve's. Steve swallows dryly, throat working, eyes wide open to catch every second of this.
"That," Danny says, slowly and deliberately, "is amazing. But I think you already knew that, didn't you?"
"I hoped," Steve says, voice hoarse, breathing shallow with the weight of things unsaid.
"Mhm," Danny rumbles, pink tongue slipping out to trace his lips again. Steve wants to die. At the very least, he wants to go sit down in a dark room by himself for a while. "Very nice."
Steve is saved from having to think of what the hell to say to that by Grace piping up, "Hey, Project Runway is on, can I go watch, Uncle Steve?"
"Of course," Steve says, turning away from Danny's penetrating gaze. He can't handle much more of this. Sooner or later, the dam is going to break, and then. Well, then they'll find out, won't they?
But, all things considered, Steve has a pretty good feeling about this.
---
Part three of The Plan finds itself completely turned over when Steve gets a call from no other than Nana Williams. It’s unexpected and, to be honest, mildly petrifying, because she is the kind of old lady that does not take kindly to being interrupted, to being talked back to, to not being listened to with the utmost attention. Danny is terrified of her, while adoring her shamelessly, and Steve understands, he really does, after spending five minutes on the phone with her and having all his ideas and thoughts being neatly put in a box and thrown into storage.
“Young man, the way to my grandson’s heart is through his favorite drink. It’s as easy as that. So you will take pen and paper, and write down what I’m telling you.”
Steve does, and tries not to think too hard about the fact that Molly must have blabbed to all of her family, back in Jersey, about how stupidly smitten Steve is, and how he’s trying to get Danny to love him through food. And he should feel embarrassed, and stupid, only he’s not, he can’t be any more, he’s done too much already to feel embarrassed now. Now he just needs Danny to get it.
The way Nana Williams describes the perfect coffee for one Daniel Williams seems easy enough, and something Steve can disguise as a novelty. Just a pinch of cinnamon in the coffee grounds, just the right amount of sugar. It’s so uncomplicated Steve worries it won’t be enough, but he’s not going to doubt the word of Danny’s grandmother. He’s sure she’d find a way of knowing he did.
He had planned a roast, a proper one like they do in England, complete with those weird puffy pastry things, because he asked Rachel for help and she told Steve it was the one thing Danny could not get over when they visited the UK. He loved and missed it, she told Steve, and it was long and complicated and involved many things to do, so that was what Steve had planned, at first, because hours spent slaving away in the kitchen had to tell Danny something.
Instead, he buys cinnamon powder and mixes just the amount Nana Williams told him with ground coffee, and starts a pot. It smells different as it brews, something special, a little bit like Christmas, reminding Steve of too many memories involving his family as a unit when he was a kid, Mary Ann being so small she wasn’t allowed to help in the kitchen, Steve peeling oranges for the Christmas cake his mother was preparing, his dad not working for once, bouncing Mary Ann on his knee and making her laugh. It’s a strange smell, spicy and a little bitter, and Steve sits at his kitchen and watches the pot of coffee slowly fill up, entranced, a little lost in his own thoughts, in a life long gone, a life he didn’t really get to live all that much.
Of course, Danny doesn’t knock. He has never knocked, and there are no reasons for him to start now. He doesn’t knock and he walks inside Steve’s house and kitchen like he owns the place, dropping his car keys on the table loud enough to startle Steve, who shakes himself out of his own head, looking at Danny. They don’t have a case and Steve hasn’t even texted Danny to come over yet, but here Danny is anyway, looking at Steve with something fond in his eyes.
“Morning. You okay? You look like you haven’t slept. Have you slept? You know you can’t live on caffeine, Steve, we talked about this before, you can’t just go on and on until you’re running on fumes and then crashing, it doesn’t work like that.”
“I slept, Danno,” Steve says, and he smiles a little, his stomach in knots. He wants to be cool and calm and collected, but he can’t. The coffee machine makes gurgling sounds and Steve turns to it again. “I slept quite well, actually. You want coffee?”
“You don’t look like you have. And yes, why do you even ask? Of course I want coffee.”
Steve grins, and yes, it might be a little tired, a little manic for it, running on empty more than he'd ever admit, least of all to Danny, who would just mother-hen him into submission. The coffee smells so good, and he wants some desperately, but he hadn't dared help himself before Danny got here, in case Danny wanted more than Steve had taken. He's set out both their mugs by the coffee machine, his old, chipped Navy one and a huge 'I ♥ Hawai'i' one that he got Danny as a joke ages ago, but had somehow stuck (probably has more to do with its size than the message, but Steve hasn't missed the softening in Danny's eyes every time he sees it). He pours the fragrant liquid in both, stirs in the prerequisite amounts of sugar and cream, and hands Danny his mug.
He brings his own to his face, inhales the steam, watches as Danny does the same. Watches Danny's eyes widen, then narrow in rapid succession, fixing right onto Steve. Danny takes a sip; his nostrils flare, and here comes Danny's tongue again, licking off a stray droplet from his bottom lip, lingering over the curve for a long, heart-flutter-inducing moment. Danny takes another sip, and another, eyelids drooping to half-mast, much like certain parts of Steve's anatomy.
Danny doesn't say a single thing until he's finished all of the coffee, and Steve gets steadily more antsy by the second. To cover it up, he takes a drink too, has to hold back a heartfelt groan at how delicious it tastes, how a single pinch of spice can change the drink almost unrecognisably. The liquid is hot and creamy on the roof of his mouth; he can just imagine what it would be like to lick it out of Danny's mouth, flavours mingling and melding, becoming a taste he can't quite live without, addictive just like Danny himself.
Danny sets his mug down with deliberate, economical motions, none of the usual flare; it makes Steve wary, careful to do nothing to set him off. He can't read Danny's face -- it's a first, and Steve does not like it one bit. He itches to ask Danny what he thinks, but he's pretty sure Danny might explode if prodded just now. Which only leaves waiting for Danny to make up his mind; it's enough to bring Steve out in hives.
"All right," Danny says decisively. "Okay, I think you would agree, and you'd better, that I have been pretty damn patient about this whole thing, whatever it is that you've got into your strange, strange mind to do. Yes? Yes. And now I would like some answers. Starting with how the hell you got hold of my Nana's telephone number without coming through me."
Steve swallows thickly, gathers whatever shreds of dignity he has left, and decides, fuck it, this is happening, he's doing this, it's time, and the shaking in his knees can just take a damn hike already, and take the tightness in his stomach with it.
"Actually, I didn't," he says. Danny glares. "It's true! It wasn't me who called her. She, uh, she... called... me," he trails off, watching Danny's eyebrows try to climb up into his coiffed hairline.
"She what now?"
Steve fidgets, gives his body a stern talking-to, just about avoids standing to parade rest. "She did. Molly must have called her."
"Molly. And why were you speaking to Molly in the first place?"
"Well, because. I told you, I wanted to make something nice for you. A-and I could use the help, frankly, I mean, I know grease is one of your go-to food groups, but I figured, hey, cake. Gracie likes cake. And you like coco puffs, it was a logical extrapolation."
Danny is still staring at him like he's lost his mind. "You called my sister to ask what cake to make me. And she, I assume, called everyone I've ever known."
Steve cringes. "That was bad, right? I should probably have asked her not to?"
"Wouldn't have helped. Oil in the fire pan, to her. What interests me more is the reason why you called her. The real reason, Steven, I don't doubt that you need help but I call bullshit at going to my sister for that."
Steve is starting to get worried, and that just tends to make him angry. He can't help it, it's reflex. Worried often means imminently dead, and well, that tends to make him short-tempered.
"Jesus, remind me never to do anything nice for you again, if it'll get me this kind of attitude."
Danny just rolls his eyes. "Shut up," he says, poking a finger into Steve's chest. Steve stifles the need to put his hands on Danny, mainly because it would involve putting his hands on Danny, and he's well aware that he loses all objectivity when that happens, and he has no idea what he'll actually do.
"Shut up, all right, Steven, no, enough. Are you-- is this some kind of weird McGarrett mating ritual, woo your intended with food? --Wait, wait, it is, isn't it? Oh my god, it is. I knew it, with you acting all weird, and watching me like a hawk, what, you wanted to prove you could provide sustenance for me? You are such a Neanderthal."
Steve cringes, making ready to backtrack like a pro. But then Danny's hands are sliding up his chest, and one of them fists in his T-shirt, pulling him down onto Danny's lips, and after that it's all fair game, all of it, there's no backing out now, he won't let Danny back out now (unless Danny really wants to, which, it makes Steve ill just thinking about it, so he pushes it far, far away).
Steve kisses Danny like he’s never kissed anyone, with his hands holding onto Danny and his hips canted towards Danny, with noises he had no idea he could make when Danny pushes his tongue inside Steve’s mouth, tasting like coffee and cinnamon and perfection, absolute perfection, making Steve’s insides clench and melt. It’s like his best fantasy and all he’s ever wanted, but it’s even better; it’s real, and it hurts a little when Danny bites on his bottom lip; it feels exactly how it should, and Steve rolls his hips, makes Danny groan, feels hot from the soles of his feet to the tips of his hair.
It’s Steve’s whole world in a single kiss, time and space and everything else just reduced to this very moment, the two of them clinging to each other because they’ve got months, they’ve got a year and more to make up for, dancing around this thing they have and not doing anything about it. Steve’s done with not doing anything about it, he’s doing everything, now, everything he can, and he doesn’t want to ever stop.
He’s holding onto Danny’s shirt, his hair, like he can’t let go, because he can’t let go, even when Danny pulls away, breathing hard against Steve’s cheek.
“You, you. I don’t even have words for you. Can’t you talk, like a functional human being? No, of course you can’t, what am I saying.” Steve can hear the smile in his voice, breathless and relieved.
“It wasn’t to prove I can provide for you, Danny.”
“No? Then enlighten me, McGarrett, because it looks like you were trying to prove you could make me fat, and this should make me want to drag you into my cave--uh, that sounded better in my head.”
Steve chuckles, closing his eyes as he mouths along Danny’s jaw, relishing Danny’s stubble against his lips, rough and feeling like home.
“It was just. I just wanted to show you I care. Because I care, Danny, I,” Steve pauses, looking away, feeling stupid and inadequate. “Fuck.” He can’t say more, the words stuck to the roof of his mouth, feeling like molasses when he tries to spit them out, missing what he really wants to say by a mile.
“Oh, babe,” Danny says, pulling back enough to look Steve in the eye. He curls a hand around Steve’s neck, warm and comfortable there, fitting the right way. “I know you do. You didn’t have to go to all this effort, though.”
Steve smiles, looking at how red Danny’s lips are, kissed swollen. He wants to do that again, and more. “I liked doing it, though.”
He did, too. The new smells invading his kitchen, the memories they brought back up were soft and comforting, and doing this gave him a sense of finally really belonging in this house he’s been haunting since his father’s death. He’s here now, existing in this space and making it his own, through the lives of his mother and father and sister before him, through his own past.
Danny raises an eyebrow, running a hand through his hair, fingers threading through the blond strands, and Steve wants to do that, too.
“Really? Even the breakfast dog? Because I ate yours, and you seemed ready to collapse, just looking at it.”
“Well, yeah, that was disgusting, and you’re going to clog your arteries with that stuff, but. The sounds you made while eating it, Danny.”
Just thinking about it makes Steve suddenly much harder than he already is, and he presses himself against Danny, a little tighter, watching Danny’s eyes widen.
“Really? Really, watching and listening to me eat turns you on?”
Steve knows that he should be embarrassed by that, but all he can do is push Danny right against the table, and growl, “the sounds you made,” and then Danny is kissing him again, deep and hard, hand fisted in Steve's hair now, holding him in place as Steve takes all he's offering and presses closer for more. In truth, it's all these things, knowing Danny is full with the food Steve made for him, that he's happy, that he enjoyed it, it's all tangled up, and Steve is just starting to unravel all these strange urges he gets inside when he looks at Danny, when he thinks about what he wants from him.
But, apparently, he seems to have played his cards right, because here Danny is, spreading his legs open to let Steve settle between them, arching up into his weight, keeping him close and wrapped in every limb available, and he's opening for Steve so sweetly and eagerly that Steve's vision honestly blacks out for a moment, he needs this so bad.
His arms are starting to shake, not with the strain to hold himself above Danny, but with how much he doesn't want to, wants to let his body crowd Danny into the surface, slide every part of them together, take what he needs.
"So I was thinking," he says into the skin under Danny's jaw, and Danny groans, lets his head thunk back onto the table.
"What now, why are you still thinking, why, this isn't enough for you?"
Steve bites back the instinctive reply that fuck no, this will never be enough for him, he will never have enough of Danny. "Shush," he says, silencing Danny's instinctive protest, judging by the way his eyebrows furrow. "I was thinking, those danger dogs, could they be the reason I noticed you slowing down during yesterday's chase? Because let me tell you, I can't be having that in a partner. I think you need to exercise them off."
"What," Danny says, scowling darkly. "Did you just insinuate that I'm fat? Because let me tell you something, McGarrett, you ain't no lightweight either, I almost dislocated my shoulder pulling you up that cliff--"
Steve kisses him again, muffling Danny's continuing rant with his mouth. The kiss is sloppy, a fight for dominance made worse when Steve gets the giggles and can't quite hide them.
"All I'm saying is, maybe you'd like to get some exercise in between chases, and--and, Danny, shut up and listen, will you, I would be a most willing partner in said exercise."
Danny opens his mouth again -- and then, glory be, he gets a clue. "O-oh! Oh. Okay, all right, I can definitely get behind that, sure. Goes both ways, I guess. But not here, okay? If I'm to get a workout," he squeezes Steve's ass to make a point, and Steve jerks forward helplessly, just about managing to stifle a needy whimper, "I would like it to be on a more, shall we say, giving surface."
"Bed it is," Steve says cheerfully, 'Danny'-translation fully engaged and unlikely to fail any time soon.
That, he can work with. And if every time they happen to eat something rich gets a follow-up like that, well. He can see a wonderfully varied menu in their future.
-----
Authors:
delicatale and sirona_gsPairing: Steve/Danny
Rating: Hard R
Word count: ~8,300
Warnings: er, fluff?
Summary: Steve realises just how much time he's been spending with Gracie when that's how he starts referring to his plan to woo Danny through terrible, heart-attack-inducing Jersey food. He has researched, he has strategized, he has called in reinforcements. There really isn't any way this could go wrong.
Notes: So
delicatale said to me, DO YOU KNOW THAT FIC WHERE STEVE SPENDS HOURS AND HOURS LEARNING HOW TO COOK ALL THE BEST SPECIALITIES OF NJ TO MAKE DANNY HAPPY AND DANNY IS OBLIVIOUS BECAUSE THAT'S WHO HE IS? BECAUSE THAT FIC SHOULD EXIST. Thus, there you have it! And because we were both feeling a little low, and needed a pick-me-up, this got written in literally under 10 hours, all told. Also, it's come to our notice that there are apparently a lot of people out there right now who are feeling ill, or under the weather, or a little low. So this is for all of you guys, with our love. <3After much covert (and, he's grudgingly willing to concede, slightly obsessive even for him) observation, Steve can at last confirm his findings. Danny, it seems, despite being amazing, and interestingly eloquent, and a proper firecracker to boot, is no different than any other man in Steve's acquaintance. In other words -- the way to Danny's heart, Steve has concluded, is through his stomach.
Because Danny, Danny loves his food like nothing Steve has ever seen. Danny eats like he--uh. Well. Steve has nothing but suspicions, and a slightly overactive imagination at this point, despite his attempts to the contrary, but he would like to think that Danny eats like he makes love, because, seriously, no one should make the kinds of sounds that come out of Danny's mouth at the dinner table. Not unless he wants to be pressed against the surface and ravished, which, this is usually the point when Steve's brain shuts down in self-defence.
The worst thing about his embarrassing crush on his partner? Is how often these kinds of thoughts slip into Steve's mind, every single day. It's getting to the point where Steve finds himself at half-mast at the mere mention of lunch, or when Chin brings in a box of Liliha's coco puffs. Danny's face when he sees the box in Chin's hands is a thing of beauty -- and has a starring role in Steve's dreams of late, only it's not Chin who is holding the box, and it isn't really the focus of Danny's attention.
This has got to stop, one way or another. And since Steve can no more imagine figuring out a way to stop thinking about it, bar sending Danny back to HPD (which is not an option), it's door number two. And there's really nothing else to be done. Steve will have to seduce him, and make sure Danny only eats with him whenever possible.
Thus, Steve devises a cunning plan. He has researched, he has strategized, he has called in reinforcements. There really isn't any way this could go wrong.
---
Steve has a few, very slight, reservations regarding what he is about to attempt. It looks easy enough, if getting a hot dog wrapped in bacon to stay wrapped as he deep-fries it can ever be called easy. Just the thought of subjecting his arteries to that hellish concoction makes him want to break out in hives, but, well. He imagines the look on Danny's face when he sees it, and strangely enough it soothes his doubts to a manageable degree. It's Saturday lunchtime anyway; maybe he can goad Danny into going on a hike with him again, or just for a long walk, or to the beach with Chin and Kono and Lori tomorrow, burn off some calories. Oh, he'll bitch, but his heart will thank Steve twice over when he doesn't keel over and die during the next on-foot chase through Waikiki.
Procuring the meat is pretty easy. He just hits up Kamekona, and the big guy points him straight to the best supplier on the island. It costs him more than he'd be willing to part with on an ordinary day, but fuck, if Danny's forcing Steve to feed him all the grease in the world, the least he can put up with is good quality hot dog and a bacon with as little fat as possible while still palatable. The guy who serves him is quick and efficient, cleaver flashing in the morning sunlight, and he's so good-natured about Steve's grumpy yet resigned glower that Steve makes a note to come back whenever he needs anything like this again. Back at home, he dumps his purchases on the kitchen table and unpacks them, setting them aside until he can chop up and fry the onions.
He manages (barely) not to cry as he does just that, his skills with a knife coming in surprisingly handy. He’s never been much for cooking, if only because you don’t have to in the military, but still, he finds a keen pleasure in chopping and prepping and sizzling, something wonderfully relaxing to the act. And then, there’s the idea behind the plan, the whole reason why Steve is in his kitchen, right now, frying onions and wrapping a hot dog in bacon, carefully, sticking toothpicks in each end of the bacon slice to keep it in place until it’s cooked. There’s Danny, the mental image of the face he’ll make when he’ll take the first bite, reminding him of Jersey in a way that doesn’t really scare Steve any more.
If there’s one thing he knows, Steve thinks as he pushes the sausages in the pan along with the onions, is that Danny is here now, and here to stay. It’s been hard, and Danny’s obvious fear of commitment had not helped, but, as long as Grace is here, so is Danny. Sometimes Steve thinks about how Danny didn’t leave when Rachel and Grace did, too, and it makes something funny explode in his stomach, makes him hard, too, to the point where he’s never thinking about it any more. At work.
Right now, he allows the thought to swirl around in his head, around his mouth; Danny stayed for him, to help him, because somehow Steve matters to him. Now, Steve wants to matter more, and if anyone tells him it’s selfish, well, Steve has a list as long as his leg of acts he’s done for his country, selflessly. Fuck that; he deserves this, he deserves Danny.
While the sausages cook, Steve washes his hands, the chopping board and the knife he used, before sending Danny a text to remind him of their plans. He doesn’t call it a date, because he knows better and he likes to tease and push Danny’s buttons much more when they’re in the same room, but he still thinks it. He’d be the cheapest date Danny ever had, for sure; a drink would be enough, and Danny would never let Steve live it down, but.
But as it is, they’re not there, and the more Steve thinks this way, the harder it’s going to be to hide the way his cock is tenting his cargoes.
After checking the sausages, Steve grabs another pan and gets started on the fried eggs to go under them, thinking sorrowfully about heart attacks, but still, he doesn’t back down. It’s part one of his plan, and if he ever hopes for Danny to understand what he’s trying to achieve, well, Steve has to start with a bang. A grand gesture, full of chili sauce and clogged arteries.
Steve slices the bun open as the eggs sing happily in the pan, the sausages almost ready, bacon sticking to their curves, satisfyingly brown and crispy. Some of the onions have gone black, but Steve will just leave them out. He gets flour all over the front of his shirt trying to slice the buns perfectly and failing three times before deciding it’ll do, and smears chili sauce all over them. He’s everywhere at once, turning off the gas under the sausages and checking if the egg yolks are still sort of runny, shaking pans and making sure everything is ready before he starts piling it all up on the bun. First the egg, yolk half-hard (just like Steve is), then the sausage, toothpicks carefully removed, the bacon precariously staying in place.
And there he has them. He leaves them in the oven at a very low heat just to keep them warm while waiting for Danny, who strolls in with coffees about ten minutes later, wearing jeans and a t-shirt, his hair looking soft and fluffy, despite being slicked back as always.
"Hey," he says, sniffing the air eagerly. "Have I wondered into the wrong house? Am I smelling what I think I'm smelling? Are you, Steven 'Health Freak' McGarrett, making deep-fried hot dogs for some reason? Is the world going to end in the next half an hour, did you set off something that will blow up the planet, is this an end-of-world party? Is that why you went all Punctuality Squad on me?"
Steve rolls his eyes. Strangely, the state of his cock does not alter with the ramble. He's got it bad. He rolls his eyes for cover.
"Hello to you, too," he says dryly, reaching for the coffee Danny's holding out. "What's with the third degree?"
Danny eyes him, transfers his measuring gaze onto the pile of dirty pans in the sink, and lifts an eyebrow.
"I know it's not my birthday. Do you know how I know that, Steven? Because my birthday is in August, and it is not August right now. So the only rational explanation I've got for this departure from the norm from you is end-of-world scenarios--aaand I realised what I just said. Forget all that; rational, what was I thinking."
A hand waves precariously close to Steve's nose as Danny dismisses his ramble, pulling out a chair at the table and plonking himself down like he's just run all the way here from his flat.
"You done?" Steve says, laying out plates and dropping a pile of paper napkins on the table.
"Yep, I'm done, come on, food now. It smells amazing, what the hell have you got in there?"
Steve makes a big show of removing the hot dogs from the oven, still warm and delicious-looking, and setting them on the table. Danny's eyes go huge, so blue it's almost painful to look at them head-on; Steve has to look away so he doesn't become a cliche and get lost in them, because that would just be fucking embarrassing at this point. He pulls out the bottle of chilli sauce that he'd gone to the shop to get last night after work, places it between them on the table. Then he snags two beers from the fridge, snaps them open and hands one to Danny, who takes it as if in a trance.
Danny's mouth is open, jaw working like he wants to say something, say a lot of things, but no words are coming, and after a moment of staring he reaches for the chilli sauce, slurps a generous serving over his food, and picks it up.
And, really. That sound right there, if Steve could bottle it he would make a killing -- if he wasn't so damn selfish when it came to Danny and all his sounds, and words, and looks.
Danny chews and swallows, and moans, and goes back for more, mouth opening wide and teeth chomping down firmly, sauce dribbling out of one corner of his lips. Steve must have stopped breathing a while back, because his lungs ache, and his skin feels too small for his body.
"Steven," Danny groans, and Steve has to bite down hard on the inside of his mouth not to press the heel of his hand to the front of his pants and rub himself off right there and then. "Steven, what did you do, oh my God and all the saints and as many Hail Marys as this requires, I don't even care if you're about to blow up the world, I would die happy right now."
Danny's lips are red where the spicy chilli has rubbed them flushed, and he runs his tongue over them before taking another bite and closing his eyes, releasing a sound Steve has never heard before, even in the bedroom, and Cath could moan with the best of them. He can't stop staring. He can't. He's vaguely aware that he is being a right ass about this, because perving over your partner, surely that isn't in the approved handbook of appropriate reactions to one's co-workers. But Danny is incredible like this, pure delight, enjoyment and happiness leaking off him and suffusing the air, warming Steve to his core.
"What are you doing, what, for the sake of everything holy eat that before I take it off you," Danny mumbles, mouth still half-full, eyeing Steve's own hot dog greedily. Steve desperately wants to say, 'nah, 's all right, you have it', but that would just be weird, and Danny's not stupid, not by a long shot. He's bound to figure out something isn't right.
...But then again, isn't that the point of this exercise? For Danny to be wowed by Steve's prowess in the kitchen? Steve debates with himself, until the decision is taken out of his hands entirely when Danny finishes his own food and pulls Steve's plate closer, drenching it with chilli sauce again and demolishing it faster than Steve can blink. He can't quite contain the pleased smile over his face, and he's expecting endless mocking for that once Danny can speak again.
Danny, surprisingly, says nothing. No, he licks his fingers clean, and only after he's made sure every last drop of sauce is off them does he reach for a napkin, leaning back in his chair and sighing, a little whimper of pleasure in the back of his throat, and fuck, if he makes Steve stand up right now, the game will be well and truly over. It's enough that his breathing is rapid, and his pupils are dilated, and he's pretty sure his cheeks are flushed, and if Danny was capable of higher thought at the moment Steve is sure he'd be screwed anyway.
"You know," Danny drawls, a sensuous sound that makes Steve want to grab him by the arms and haul him in his lap. "I don't even care that you're mocking me right now, I can see that smirk, I know when I'm being mocked. It doesn't even matter. You know why? Because you made me a danger dog, and you didn't even add pineapple. You, Steven, are officially my second favourite person in the world after Grace."
Steve breathes a sigh of relief. This, he can work with. "I take it you enjoyed that, then," he says dryly, fighting a smile. Danny doesn't look like he's fooled. He picks up his beer bottle, offers the neck to Steve. Bemused, Steve clinks his bottle to Danny's, because, well. It's automatic.
"Thank you," Danny says, eyes serious for once. "I don't know what made you do it, or what crazy thought you had in that head of yours, but thank you. That was... It was. Something."
"You're welcome, Danno," Steve says, doesn't elaborate. Danny lets him get away with it with merely a raised eyebrow.
After that, well, there's a game on TV, and Steve sneaks in a sandwich while he makes popcorn and fetches more beer. He feels better about it than the heart-attack-on-a-plate; Danny is full, pleased--scratch that, vocally happy where he's yelling at the TV and back at Steve through the open kitchen door; all is right with the world. And even if nothing more happens today, Steve will still count it as a win.
---
Steve rehearsed this call all of the night before, wondering exactly how it’d go, running his explanation for the call over and over again in his head. He’d call Ma Williams, but for having been on the phone a few times with her already, he knows she’d give him so much shit for trying to pretend he was doing this for any other reason than to seduce Danny, and he isn’t sure he can deal with that. It’s hard enough not to break and just tell Danny; he knows he has no chance of standing his ground under the pressure from Danny’s mother.
His second choice is Molly. As the youngest of the Williams tribe, she had to have insights of what her brother likes to eat best, when it comes to cake - something Steve is still not privy to, besides coco puffs and malasadas, which just won’t do. And Molly’s nice to him, she doesn’t quite mock him as much as Holly does. He’ll remember their visit forever, though, the tsunami the two of them were on the island and in his life, in Danny’s life, for the span of the week they spent in Honolulu.
So he decides on Molly. And it’s awkward; fuck, it’s awkward, and he tries to be casual about it, his excuse that Danny’s just broke his 100th case sounding fake and weird to his own ears, but she seems to buy it. She seems to buy it enough to let out, “Pineapple,” and Steve chokes on his next breath.
“Pineapple,” he repeats, like he didn’t heard her right. He worries his bottom lip between his teeth as he looks up the recipe on the Internet, pressing the phone even closer to his ear.
“Are you sure about that?” he asks, because he’s not sure if Molly isn’t taking him for a ride, here. He doesn’t want to fuck this up, he cannot fuck this up, and if she’s mocking him and giving him the wrong idea, well, his carefully cooked danger dog will have been a waste, and he’ll have to start from scratch.
“I am sure about that, Steve. He doesn’t say he likes it, but I promise you, there is little else other than a pineapple upside-down cake that gets him going.”
Steve feels himself flush. “I don’t want to get him going, Molly.”
Molly laughs heartily. “Yeah, right. I might be nice, but I’m not stupid, Steve. I tell you, pineapple upside-down cake. Believe me, okay?”
“Okay, okay.” Steve runs a hand over his face, closing his eyes as he makes an internal list of the ingredients he’s got in the kitchen, just to make sure he can even do this cake if he decides on it. It’s not like he’s got many other choices anyway, and he’s got to trust Danny’s very own sister with this, because he’s got no one else to ask.
“Any regular chocolate cake will do, too, but it won’t have the same effect, believe me.”
Steve nods. He wants Danny to make the noises he made while eating the danger dog again, he needs to hear these sounds again, to see Danny look that way. So he nods to himself.
“Okay. Thanks, Molly, I appreciate it.”
“That’s okay. Any time you need, Steve, I like my brother happy, and seems you help with that, so,” she lets it hang, there, and Steve flushes again, like a fucking schoolboy with an embarrassing crush.
“I, um. I should go, get started on that cake.”
Molly chuckles again, this time indulgently. “Yeah, okay. Bye, Steve.”
“Thanks again. Bye.”
After this certainly awkward and embarrassing phone call, Steve prints out a recipe for a pineapple upside-down cake, and makes sure he’s got everything in his pantry to make said cake. He’s not lacking in anything, which is not surprising considering he bought everything in bulk, but suddenly he’s faced with the enormity of this - what he’s doing. He’s baking a cake, for Danny, a cake with pineapples in it, when Danny has spent so long telling him all the ways in which he doesn’t like pineapples. It’s crazy, and Steve doesn’t bake, he’s not baked anything since before his mother died, when he helped out just to be able to lick the bowl.
He remembers the easy rhythm of flour-butter-sugar-eggs, though, and tries (and fails) not to make too big of a mess around the kitchen while he sets to. He spends the time taken up by whisking and measuring to try and think of an excuse for doing this that will fly with Danny, other than 'Look, I kind of might be quite a bit in love with you, and seriously, the noises you make, my bed feels cold and lonely without you in it', which, while true, is not something Steve can say without choking at certain points. In the end he can't actually think of anything that will even remotely count as an excuse, and resorts to cheating. He knows Danny's schedule like he knows his own, and Danny has Grace this weekend. Which would be the perfect excuse for having a treat lying around for when Gracie comes to visit with her dad.
Danny, when Steve calls him and invites them over, doesn't suspect a thing. Success! thinks Steve, and pours the batter into a cake form, shoving it into the preheated oven and pulling the whipped cream carton out of the fridge. He's testing the consistency when cars slam in the doorway and running footsteps close in, followed by the front door slamming open and Gracie's "Uncle Steeeeve! We're here!" yelled from the living room.
Grace appears in the kitchen doorway a moment later, flushed and grinning, obviously excited to be here. Steve's heart flips over in his chest and then sends heat through his entire body; he grins back helplessly.
"Hey, Gracie," he says, patting the front of his clothes to get rid of the flour before he crouches down to give her a hug. She hangs on when he tries to straighten and, laughing, he takes her up with him.
"What are you making?" she wants to know, peeking at the bowl of whipped cream curiously.
"It's a pineapple upside-down cake," Steve confides. "Do you think we could persuade Danno to have some?" It's good to set up some ground work, for if and when he might need it.
“Oh, Danno loves it! He doesn’t like to say, though.”
Steve grins, something happy and satisfied blossoming in his chest. Molly didn’t lie, and he’s doing this, and it’s going to work out. It has to, because if it doesn’t, and Danny doesn’t get it, well, he has no idea what he’s going to do. But he can’t go there, it’s too soon for him to worry about his plan not working out in the end, not giving him the results he wants (needs).
“Wanna help me put the glaze on?”
“Yes!”
“What are you two conspiring about? What is that smell?”
"Steve is making a cake! It's your favourite, Danno!"
"Oh yeah?" Danny walks inside finally, dressed just as casually as last time, those black jeans of his that tend to give Steve palpitations and a plain white T-shirt. He looks so much like that time Steve made Danny climb to the summit with him that something shakes loose in Steve's chest, the image of Danny making a giant heart in the air and pointing at him. Steve doesn't even know how he held himself together, didn't blubber his feelings everywhere for the world to see.
Danny walks closer, tweaks Grace's plaits when Steve puts her down, looks down at the whipped cream and the rum glaze, and back at Steve.
"Huh," he says, and there's something knowing in his eyes that makes Steve break out in goosebumps. He can't look away.
"Uncle Steve, the timer's about to go!"
Steve turns to look, at that. Grace has her nose almost pressed to the oven door, watching the cake through the fireproof glass. "Come away, Gracie, you'll get burned. Is it ready, do you think?"
"Uh-huh!" Grace says, nodding eagerly.
"All right, then! Let's take it out!"
He fetches the oven mitts and turns the heat off, opens the door and stands back to let the steam escape. Grace is almost vibrating by Danny's side, watching Steve bring the cake to the table, where there's a wire rack waiting.
"Do you like whipped cream or ice cream on yours, Gracie?" he asks, to distract her from having to wait a few minutes before they can turn it over.
"Ice cream!" is the answer; the 'obviously' goes unsaid, but it's heavily implied.
"Okay," he says, smiling. "Ice cream it is. Danny?"
"I like cream," Danny says, sliding his eyes away from the bowl of it on the counter.
"Excellent! I have us all covered. Here, Gracie, bring me that plate."
She does, and they all watch as Steve deftly turns the cake over. Caramel drizzles down over the pineapples, and the cake glistens deliciously. Steve raises a questioning eyebrow at Danny, picking up the bottle of dark rum. Danny nods, waves a hand. Steve splashes some in a shotglass, hands it to Grace, and together they drizzle it over the top of the cake.
"Perfect," Grace declares, bouncing on her heels.
"Yes it is," Danny agrees, sending Steve a Look. Steve shrugs. "But before we can all have some, it has to cool, remember."
Grace nods gravely. "Can we go for a swim?"
"Can you go for a swim? Ask your Uncle Steve here, nicely."
"Can we please go for a swim, Uncle Steve?" she chirps, like there's any chance in hell that Steve would, or could, say no to her. Danny's laughing at him silently; he knows, the bastard.
"Sure, Gracie. I think you left your spare swimsuit in Mary's room last time. Why don't you go put it on?"
Grace runs out, and Steve sends Danny a dry look.
"I won't eat any of it until you're back," Danny declares.
"Didn't think you would," Steve lies. But he can't help it -- he wants to be there when Danny takes his first mouthful. He wants to savour the view.
Grace is back before he can say anything more, and he gets changed into his own swimshorts, races her out to the waterfront, laughing as he goes. He can feel Danny's gaze drilling between his shoulderblades, watching them from the back door. He tries not to let it affect him, but he’s quite grateful for the shock of cold water when he wades into the ocean anyway.
He plays with Gracie for a while, and she manages to make him forget about everything, his plan and his worries and work, and even Danny, a little, until she’s shrieking and laughing and looking so much like both her parents it’s making Steve’s heart clench.
When they get out Danny is waiting for them with two towels, big fluffy white ones he must have found in Steve’s laundry room. He wraps Grace in one, handing the other to Steve, his eyes flicking over Steve before moving away quickly, like, like he’s embarrassed or scared of his own thoughts, which is sort of good, in Steve’s opinion. Good, or terribly bad, depending.
But then they’re back in the kitchen with Gracie all wrapped up, her pigtails dripping on the towel, and Steve with his own towel around his shoulders, and he meets Danny’s eyes over the cake, and that is definitely not bad, that look there, it’s a good look. It’s a look that is sort of undressing Steve, and he’s already not wearing a lot, so it’s definitely a good look where Steve is concerned.
“Can we have some of the cake now?” Grace sounds too excited and Steve’s stomach grumbles, so he gets a knife, cake forks and some plates from his cupboards, leaving them on the table.
“Yeah, we definitely should.” He cuts three pieces, fairly even, gives Grace hers before handing one to Danny, leaving the third piece in front of himself, but he doesn’t touch it.
“Oh, Uncle Steve, that’s so good!” Steve smiles at Grace’s exclamation, but he doesn’t turn to her, keeping his eyes trained on Danny as he breaks a piece of the cake, playing with it for a moment, like he’s reluctant to try it.
“I thought you liked pineapple upside-down cake?”
Danny looks up, startled. Grace is already absorbed in one of the books she brought with her, not really paying attention to them any more, and Steve is glad, so glad, because he’s blushing and he doesn’t want her to notice, he doesn’t even want Danny to notice that, fuck, he’s making a fool of himself.
“I do! I do. It’s just. Okay, so the other day you made us danger dogs, and now this, is there like, some kind of half-birthday thing I’ve missed, or are you about to tell me something really upsetting and you’re trying to placate me with food? I just like to know what I’m getting myself into, and I have no idea what’s going on here.”
Steve feels his mouth go dry and he contemplates his own piece of cake; fuck, he doesn’t like pineapple cake all that much, and it’s not going to help the way his mouth feels like sandpaper. The excuse he gave Molly will not work with Danny, and he can’t tell him the truth, he’s not helping him more than he’s already trying. Steve is not about to do all the work, here.
“I knew you had Grace, so I thought she’d like a cake.”
Danny stares at him. And it's just, this is one of the reasons he lo--uh. Likes Danny so much. Danny is no fool. Danny is, in fact, one of the best detectives Steve has ever worked with, and Danny has never been afraid to call him on his bullshit. Which he is now doing, even when he isn't saying a word. And a quiet Danny is a dangerous Danny.
"Are you serious with this?" Danny says after a moment, softly, so Grace doesn't hear. Steve fidgets, looks down at his plate, away at Gracie's dark head.
"I just thought. We never really did anything after you, uh, stayed here to help me, rather than go back to Jersey. And I never said thank you. Because I am grateful, Danny, you don't know how much. You--it really, um. It was--good."
Danny's watching him again, but this time his eyes are soft, and his mouth has turned up into this small smile, sad, almost. He looks like he wants to say--a lot. But then his gaze falls on Grace again, and then he's narrowing his eyes and sending Steve this Look, the one that pretty much spells out 'We're not done talking about this'. Steve ducks his head, doesn't say anything, because, yeah. They're not done, not by a long shot, not if he has anything to say about it.
Point made, Danny looks back down at his plate. He slices off the end of the piece with his fork, picks it up and, looking straight at Steve, puts it in his mouth. His eyes flutter close, and he makes a guttural sound deep in his throat, chews, licks his lips. His eyes open again, at half-mast, icy blue peeking through long eyelashes, fixing unerringly on Steve's. Steve swallows dryly, throat working, eyes wide open to catch every second of this.
"That," Danny says, slowly and deliberately, "is amazing. But I think you already knew that, didn't you?"
"I hoped," Steve says, voice hoarse, breathing shallow with the weight of things unsaid.
"Mhm," Danny rumbles, pink tongue slipping out to trace his lips again. Steve wants to die. At the very least, he wants to go sit down in a dark room by himself for a while. "Very nice."
Steve is saved from having to think of what the hell to say to that by Grace piping up, "Hey, Project Runway is on, can I go watch, Uncle Steve?"
"Of course," Steve says, turning away from Danny's penetrating gaze. He can't handle much more of this. Sooner or later, the dam is going to break, and then. Well, then they'll find out, won't they?
But, all things considered, Steve has a pretty good feeling about this.
---
Part three of The Plan finds itself completely turned over when Steve gets a call from no other than Nana Williams. It’s unexpected and, to be honest, mildly petrifying, because she is the kind of old lady that does not take kindly to being interrupted, to being talked back to, to not being listened to with the utmost attention. Danny is terrified of her, while adoring her shamelessly, and Steve understands, he really does, after spending five minutes on the phone with her and having all his ideas and thoughts being neatly put in a box and thrown into storage.
“Young man, the way to my grandson’s heart is through his favorite drink. It’s as easy as that. So you will take pen and paper, and write down what I’m telling you.”
Steve does, and tries not to think too hard about the fact that Molly must have blabbed to all of her family, back in Jersey, about how stupidly smitten Steve is, and how he’s trying to get Danny to love him through food. And he should feel embarrassed, and stupid, only he’s not, he can’t be any more, he’s done too much already to feel embarrassed now. Now he just needs Danny to get it.
The way Nana Williams describes the perfect coffee for one Daniel Williams seems easy enough, and something Steve can disguise as a novelty. Just a pinch of cinnamon in the coffee grounds, just the right amount of sugar. It’s so uncomplicated Steve worries it won’t be enough, but he’s not going to doubt the word of Danny’s grandmother. He’s sure she’d find a way of knowing he did.
He had planned a roast, a proper one like they do in England, complete with those weird puffy pastry things, because he asked Rachel for help and she told Steve it was the one thing Danny could not get over when they visited the UK. He loved and missed it, she told Steve, and it was long and complicated and involved many things to do, so that was what Steve had planned, at first, because hours spent slaving away in the kitchen had to tell Danny something.
Instead, he buys cinnamon powder and mixes just the amount Nana Williams told him with ground coffee, and starts a pot. It smells different as it brews, something special, a little bit like Christmas, reminding Steve of too many memories involving his family as a unit when he was a kid, Mary Ann being so small she wasn’t allowed to help in the kitchen, Steve peeling oranges for the Christmas cake his mother was preparing, his dad not working for once, bouncing Mary Ann on his knee and making her laugh. It’s a strange smell, spicy and a little bitter, and Steve sits at his kitchen and watches the pot of coffee slowly fill up, entranced, a little lost in his own thoughts, in a life long gone, a life he didn’t really get to live all that much.
Of course, Danny doesn’t knock. He has never knocked, and there are no reasons for him to start now. He doesn’t knock and he walks inside Steve’s house and kitchen like he owns the place, dropping his car keys on the table loud enough to startle Steve, who shakes himself out of his own head, looking at Danny. They don’t have a case and Steve hasn’t even texted Danny to come over yet, but here Danny is anyway, looking at Steve with something fond in his eyes.
“Morning. You okay? You look like you haven’t slept. Have you slept? You know you can’t live on caffeine, Steve, we talked about this before, you can’t just go on and on until you’re running on fumes and then crashing, it doesn’t work like that.”
“I slept, Danno,” Steve says, and he smiles a little, his stomach in knots. He wants to be cool and calm and collected, but he can’t. The coffee machine makes gurgling sounds and Steve turns to it again. “I slept quite well, actually. You want coffee?”
“You don’t look like you have. And yes, why do you even ask? Of course I want coffee.”
Steve grins, and yes, it might be a little tired, a little manic for it, running on empty more than he'd ever admit, least of all to Danny, who would just mother-hen him into submission. The coffee smells so good, and he wants some desperately, but he hadn't dared help himself before Danny got here, in case Danny wanted more than Steve had taken. He's set out both their mugs by the coffee machine, his old, chipped Navy one and a huge 'I ♥ Hawai'i' one that he got Danny as a joke ages ago, but had somehow stuck (probably has more to do with its size than the message, but Steve hasn't missed the softening in Danny's eyes every time he sees it). He pours the fragrant liquid in both, stirs in the prerequisite amounts of sugar and cream, and hands Danny his mug.
He brings his own to his face, inhales the steam, watches as Danny does the same. Watches Danny's eyes widen, then narrow in rapid succession, fixing right onto Steve. Danny takes a sip; his nostrils flare, and here comes Danny's tongue again, licking off a stray droplet from his bottom lip, lingering over the curve for a long, heart-flutter-inducing moment. Danny takes another sip, and another, eyelids drooping to half-mast, much like certain parts of Steve's anatomy.
Danny doesn't say a single thing until he's finished all of the coffee, and Steve gets steadily more antsy by the second. To cover it up, he takes a drink too, has to hold back a heartfelt groan at how delicious it tastes, how a single pinch of spice can change the drink almost unrecognisably. The liquid is hot and creamy on the roof of his mouth; he can just imagine what it would be like to lick it out of Danny's mouth, flavours mingling and melding, becoming a taste he can't quite live without, addictive just like Danny himself.
Danny sets his mug down with deliberate, economical motions, none of the usual flare; it makes Steve wary, careful to do nothing to set him off. He can't read Danny's face -- it's a first, and Steve does not like it one bit. He itches to ask Danny what he thinks, but he's pretty sure Danny might explode if prodded just now. Which only leaves waiting for Danny to make up his mind; it's enough to bring Steve out in hives.
"All right," Danny says decisively. "Okay, I think you would agree, and you'd better, that I have been pretty damn patient about this whole thing, whatever it is that you've got into your strange, strange mind to do. Yes? Yes. And now I would like some answers. Starting with how the hell you got hold of my Nana's telephone number without coming through me."
Steve swallows thickly, gathers whatever shreds of dignity he has left, and decides, fuck it, this is happening, he's doing this, it's time, and the shaking in his knees can just take a damn hike already, and take the tightness in his stomach with it.
"Actually, I didn't," he says. Danny glares. "It's true! It wasn't me who called her. She, uh, she... called... me," he trails off, watching Danny's eyebrows try to climb up into his coiffed hairline.
"She what now?"
Steve fidgets, gives his body a stern talking-to, just about avoids standing to parade rest. "She did. Molly must have called her."
"Molly. And why were you speaking to Molly in the first place?"
"Well, because. I told you, I wanted to make something nice for you. A-and I could use the help, frankly, I mean, I know grease is one of your go-to food groups, but I figured, hey, cake. Gracie likes cake. And you like coco puffs, it was a logical extrapolation."
Danny is still staring at him like he's lost his mind. "You called my sister to ask what cake to make me. And she, I assume, called everyone I've ever known."
Steve cringes. "That was bad, right? I should probably have asked her not to?"
"Wouldn't have helped. Oil in the fire pan, to her. What interests me more is the reason why you called her. The real reason, Steven, I don't doubt that you need help but I call bullshit at going to my sister for that."
Steve is starting to get worried, and that just tends to make him angry. He can't help it, it's reflex. Worried often means imminently dead, and well, that tends to make him short-tempered.
"Jesus, remind me never to do anything nice for you again, if it'll get me this kind of attitude."
Danny just rolls his eyes. "Shut up," he says, poking a finger into Steve's chest. Steve stifles the need to put his hands on Danny, mainly because it would involve putting his hands on Danny, and he's well aware that he loses all objectivity when that happens, and he has no idea what he'll actually do.
"Shut up, all right, Steven, no, enough. Are you-- is this some kind of weird McGarrett mating ritual, woo your intended with food? --Wait, wait, it is, isn't it? Oh my god, it is. I knew it, with you acting all weird, and watching me like a hawk, what, you wanted to prove you could provide sustenance for me? You are such a Neanderthal."
Steve cringes, making ready to backtrack like a pro. But then Danny's hands are sliding up his chest, and one of them fists in his T-shirt, pulling him down onto Danny's lips, and after that it's all fair game, all of it, there's no backing out now, he won't let Danny back out now (unless Danny really wants to, which, it makes Steve ill just thinking about it, so he pushes it far, far away).
Steve kisses Danny like he’s never kissed anyone, with his hands holding onto Danny and his hips canted towards Danny, with noises he had no idea he could make when Danny pushes his tongue inside Steve’s mouth, tasting like coffee and cinnamon and perfection, absolute perfection, making Steve’s insides clench and melt. It’s like his best fantasy and all he’s ever wanted, but it’s even better; it’s real, and it hurts a little when Danny bites on his bottom lip; it feels exactly how it should, and Steve rolls his hips, makes Danny groan, feels hot from the soles of his feet to the tips of his hair.
It’s Steve’s whole world in a single kiss, time and space and everything else just reduced to this very moment, the two of them clinging to each other because they’ve got months, they’ve got a year and more to make up for, dancing around this thing they have and not doing anything about it. Steve’s done with not doing anything about it, he’s doing everything, now, everything he can, and he doesn’t want to ever stop.
He’s holding onto Danny’s shirt, his hair, like he can’t let go, because he can’t let go, even when Danny pulls away, breathing hard against Steve’s cheek.
“You, you. I don’t even have words for you. Can’t you talk, like a functional human being? No, of course you can’t, what am I saying.” Steve can hear the smile in his voice, breathless and relieved.
“It wasn’t to prove I can provide for you, Danny.”
“No? Then enlighten me, McGarrett, because it looks like you were trying to prove you could make me fat, and this should make me want to drag you into my cave--uh, that sounded better in my head.”
Steve chuckles, closing his eyes as he mouths along Danny’s jaw, relishing Danny’s stubble against his lips, rough and feeling like home.
“It was just. I just wanted to show you I care. Because I care, Danny, I,” Steve pauses, looking away, feeling stupid and inadequate. “Fuck.” He can’t say more, the words stuck to the roof of his mouth, feeling like molasses when he tries to spit them out, missing what he really wants to say by a mile.
“Oh, babe,” Danny says, pulling back enough to look Steve in the eye. He curls a hand around Steve’s neck, warm and comfortable there, fitting the right way. “I know you do. You didn’t have to go to all this effort, though.”
Steve smiles, looking at how red Danny’s lips are, kissed swollen. He wants to do that again, and more. “I liked doing it, though.”
He did, too. The new smells invading his kitchen, the memories they brought back up were soft and comforting, and doing this gave him a sense of finally really belonging in this house he’s been haunting since his father’s death. He’s here now, existing in this space and making it his own, through the lives of his mother and father and sister before him, through his own past.
Danny raises an eyebrow, running a hand through his hair, fingers threading through the blond strands, and Steve wants to do that, too.
“Really? Even the breakfast dog? Because I ate yours, and you seemed ready to collapse, just looking at it.”
“Well, yeah, that was disgusting, and you’re going to clog your arteries with that stuff, but. The sounds you made while eating it, Danny.”
Just thinking about it makes Steve suddenly much harder than he already is, and he presses himself against Danny, a little tighter, watching Danny’s eyes widen.
“Really? Really, watching and listening to me eat turns you on?”
Steve knows that he should be embarrassed by that, but all he can do is push Danny right against the table, and growl, “the sounds you made,” and then Danny is kissing him again, deep and hard, hand fisted in Steve's hair now, holding him in place as Steve takes all he's offering and presses closer for more. In truth, it's all these things, knowing Danny is full with the food Steve made for him, that he's happy, that he enjoyed it, it's all tangled up, and Steve is just starting to unravel all these strange urges he gets inside when he looks at Danny, when he thinks about what he wants from him.
But, apparently, he seems to have played his cards right, because here Danny is, spreading his legs open to let Steve settle between them, arching up into his weight, keeping him close and wrapped in every limb available, and he's opening for Steve so sweetly and eagerly that Steve's vision honestly blacks out for a moment, he needs this so bad.
His arms are starting to shake, not with the strain to hold himself above Danny, but with how much he doesn't want to, wants to let his body crowd Danny into the surface, slide every part of them together, take what he needs.
"So I was thinking," he says into the skin under Danny's jaw, and Danny groans, lets his head thunk back onto the table.
"What now, why are you still thinking, why, this isn't enough for you?"
Steve bites back the instinctive reply that fuck no, this will never be enough for him, he will never have enough of Danny. "Shush," he says, silencing Danny's instinctive protest, judging by the way his eyebrows furrow. "I was thinking, those danger dogs, could they be the reason I noticed you slowing down during yesterday's chase? Because let me tell you, I can't be having that in a partner. I think you need to exercise them off."
"What," Danny says, scowling darkly. "Did you just insinuate that I'm fat? Because let me tell you something, McGarrett, you ain't no lightweight either, I almost dislocated my shoulder pulling you up that cliff--"
Steve kisses him again, muffling Danny's continuing rant with his mouth. The kiss is sloppy, a fight for dominance made worse when Steve gets the giggles and can't quite hide them.
"All I'm saying is, maybe you'd like to get some exercise in between chases, and--and, Danny, shut up and listen, will you, I would be a most willing partner in said exercise."
Danny opens his mouth again -- and then, glory be, he gets a clue. "O-oh! Oh. Okay, all right, I can definitely get behind that, sure. Goes both ways, I guess. But not here, okay? If I'm to get a workout," he squeezes Steve's ass to make a point, and Steve jerks forward helplessly, just about managing to stifle a needy whimper, "I would like it to be on a more, shall we say, giving surface."
"Bed it is," Steve says cheerfully, 'Danny'-translation fully engaged and unlikely to fail any time soon.
That, he can work with. And if every time they happen to eat something rich gets a follow-up like that, well. He can see a wonderfully varied menu in their future.
